Three Cheers For Male Privilege…

I read the most hilarious post whilst I was perusing the internet for some inspiration and for the curious cats amongst us here is the link http://mensresistance.wordpress.com/female-privilege-checklist/. The article consisted of an exhaustive list of things women apparently enjoy as a result of being well women and whilst I was laughing and choking (at the time I was eating a bagel and as you can imagine it was extremely difficult to eat and laugh at some of the points the writer raised) I thought how suited a discussion of male privilege would be on ThePromisciousPen.

For the sake of clarity “privilege” ought to be defined.

priv·i·lege

ˈpriv(ə)lij/

noun

a special right, advantage, or immunity granted or available only to a particular person or group of people.

“education is a right, not a privilege”

verb

formal

grant a privilege or privileges to.

“English inheritance law privileged the eldest son”

Privilege is a benefit ascribed to particular people, in this case to men. Male privilege encompasses a wide range of social, economic, mental and physical advantages or rights men have over women solely because of their gender. I love being a woman. I love to sing I’m every woman at the top of my lungs whenever the opportunity arises, I love to paint my nails, shop and imagine the 2.5 kids I will rear and the exotic names I will call them. Moreover, I like the fact that I have a womb. However, I will never be so in love with my gender to the point where I pretend that men do not have it easy. Let’s get real. Let’s remove our filters and admit to the fact that men do have it easy.

I will probably lose the affection of most of my male friends who like to harp on about how hard it is being a man because men are revered as bread winners, sole providers and heads of the home ( my retort to this is always blah blah blah) but in the words of the classical musical Annie, it’s a hard not life for us.

The privilege of not having to bleed for up to a week every month is definitely one of the greatest advantages of being a man.

Men are linguistically the default gender. Words like mankind and chairman are skewed in men’s favour. Even our slang is littered with male privilege. It’s rather interesting that when addressing a group of people regardless of whether these people are strictly male or female or a mix of both we say “hey guys”. Or the fact that “he” is used when the sex of the person is unknown. I do not feel slighted by this is anyway but its a point that does deserve consideration.

Men are ascribed the privilege of not knowing. It’s ok for men to be oblivious but we must possess this thing called intuition or else how do we measure our emotional intelligence, or how else do we measure our womanhood?

Men can be unattached and that is absolutely ok. However, when a woman demonstrates similar qualities they are deemed heartless.

Women are just not afforded the same benefit of composure. We have to cry at everything like heartbreak, chick flicks, pretty things like flowers or cute babies. Society’s understanding of woman hinges on tears but society’s understanding of manhood hinges on composure. This is unfair to women like myself who do not cry at anything but death.

The boys will be boys mantra is especially discriminatory. Men are given a free pass to do exactly what they want, when they want and use the fact that they are men as a defence. For instance, a man can be involved in a number of romantic relationship at the same time and society will not bat an eyelid because of course “boys will be boys” .

Which leads me on to my next point. Men have the privilege of taking longer to settle down because supposedly women mature faster than men. However, how long are we going to use this as a cover for the male inability to choose one woman and just settle down?

There’s a burden of greatness placed on women which I expand on in my article “Great men but what about great women”. Read it here http://thepromisciouspen.wordpress.com/2014/04/14/great-women-but-what-about-great-men/ .

Men have the privilege of producing mediocre work but having it celebrated as if it were the greatest thing but the same privilege is not ascribed to women who have to work more rigorously to prove themselves.

There’s a sense of shame or guilt when a woman just wants to recoup. She has to be all these things to everybody a mother , a wife, a cook, an incredible lover but when she wants to rest the world looks down on her. Men on the other hand can recoup without any sense of guilt.

There’s the notion that men are unaware of their male privilege but I think they know. They know they possess all these advantages and secretly they are ecstatic especially because thanks to Eve they don’t have to bleed for up to a week, every month just to bear children.

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Comment

Name *

Email *

Website

Cris

I am Carrie Bradshaw, mixed with a little bit of Alley McBeal and Phoebe from Friends. In other words I am a writer, a (wannabe) lawyer and a weirdo.
I'm desperately trying to make sure my book collection exceeds my shoe collection and failing... but please do look around. The pen definitely flirts but it doesn't bite.